March 30, 2017

This morning I slept in, woke up before my alarm went off, and stayed in bed until it did. Not a bad morning.

I went to work at noon, had a walkthrough, and then basically had three hours free. I went upstairs to the cubicle pretty much spent the whole time watching lectures from my e-course and taking notes. I also discovered I couldn't get into the recording of the webinar from yesterday. I sent the support person an email and he got back to me pretty quickly, acknowledging there had been some technical difficulties but they had got it sorted and I was able to get into the recording. There isn't an option to download it so I'm going to have to record it myself at some point, probably this weekend.

At 3:30PM I had a short meeting about weeding the large print books. We're going to start that next week. Exciting stuff. Now that all of the non-fiction has been shifted, two of the open shelves have been removed and I believe the third is going down tomorrow. It has opened up so much space. So much room for activities.

Right before leaving for dinner I walked in on the middle of an angry patron at the desk. My introduction was her pointing at me and saying “What about him, he looks like he knows something.” She was wanting a list with pictures of everyone incarcerated in a particular county. The librarian helping her wasn't having any luck finding anything and the patron was getting really annoyed. I started offering ideas and then the patron basically started asking if there was anyone who knew what they were doing. At that point the librarian helping her turned around to the other two librarians and the assistant and asked if anyone had ideas. We were all searching different things, trying to help, but the patron had enough, accused the entire department of not knowing anything, and left. Not two minutes later I found a list (without pictures) of all the bookings in that county, and another librarian found a list with pictures, which is probably what the patron had been referring to. If she had been even a tiny bit patient, rather than immediately getting salty the second we didn't know exactly what she was talking about, she could have gotten the information she wanted. Kind of annoying.

When I got back from dinner I was on the desk, for basically the rest of the night. It was only two hours but I didn't have anything to do off the desk so I was there for all four hours. I was productive in that time and finally made it through taking notes on all the lecture videos. I also got all my folders for the class organized. Now I need to condense everything that was covered into a bite-sized summary. Totally doable.

I also came up with what I want my displays to be next month. I have the kiosk upstairs, which doesn't check out that well so you basically just have to set it and forget it. I'm going to do gardening books, because it seems like we're around the time that people think about gardening. I also have the DVD display. I just had it in February and picked a really broad topic so I could just go and pull DVDs without having a list or putting too much thought into it. It also helps when other people have to fill it if it gets too low. So that is my new goal every time I have the DVD display. My new idea is Thrills & Spills, so I can just pull movies with action and excitement and whatever else. Should be easy.

I played around with sign ideas for the DVD display tonight and that is going to be a little tough. Of the two I like so far, one involves a baby elephant faceplanting in water and the other involves two puppies running together and one of them has tripped. I also put confetti over the top of each one because confetti is thrilling. Both will most likely be deemed “too wacky”.

At the end of the night it was a little stressful trying to get everyone out of the library after the big event in the auditorium. It was huge. They had all our extra chairs and there were still a bunch of people standing in the back. And inevitably there were a lot of people standing around after it was over. They weren't bad about it though, like some people are. They were trying to pick the place up and there was some urgency to it. I just had to stand there to add a little more incentive.

When I got home I ate some popcorn, clicked around the internet, and watched YouTube videos. And now it is 11:30PM. Ideally I will be able to come up with a my display signs tomorrow and get books pulled so I can put the displays up on Monday. Lofty goals.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed.

March 29, 2017

This morning when I got to work I had some free time and I can't remember what I did with that time. It must not have been all that important.

Around ten o'clock I went upstairs so I could be ready when my webinar started at 10:30AM. The overall idea of the webinar was media literacy. Which is apparently different than information literacy. In my understanding, information literacy is being aware that you need information and knowing where to find it. And media literacy is being able to determine the reliability of a particular piece of media. At the very least I think I'm in the ballpark. There seems to be some overlap.

Anyway, the webinar was interesting and there was a lot of useful information, include the list of resources. I don't think any of it was groundbreaking, it was kind of just a refresher on the stuff I learned in college and grad school, but I'd say it was worth it. When the recording goes up I'll probably watch it again and try to take better notes. It was paid for by our library system in exchange for me giving a presentation on it at one of their training days. I thought this would be relatively soon but it apparently isn't until November. Yikes. There is no way I'm even going to remember this happened by the time November roles around without copious reminders.

After the webinar I finished updating my attendance spreadsheet and then went to lunch. It was pretty much raining all day and when I was walking to my car for lunch it was doing this weird misting thing that was pretty much blowing horizontal. I didn't really think much of it until I sat down in my car and the front of my pants were completely damp. Not cool, rain.

This afternoon I played with my schedule calendar for awhile and then I was on desk for a couple hours. I spent a lot of that time watching and taking notes on the the tutorial ecourse I took because I haven't gotten around to finishing all of the videos. I need to do that and write a report about the class as a whole just a proof that I actually did something and that it was useful.

For the last hour of work I looked at a Library Journal and talked to my coworkers about mostly work things.

After work I mailed my stolen credit card number fraud thing and then went to pick up Chipotle and head to my Mom's house. And on my way to my Mom's house I stopped and got gas so I wouldn't have to worry about that later. Dinner was the same old thing. I need to change things up again I think. I only had a few videos to show and they were all music-related because of the rabbit hole I fell into last night. After dinner we talked for awhile and after I mentioned my umbrella had a hole in it my mom looked around and found a brand new one in her luggage. She said every time she would go on a trip somewhere she would inevitably forget her umbrella and have to buy one. Works for me.

I also need to get new windshield wiper blades. The passenger side one has been broken for at least a couple years and when it pops out the metal part screeches on my windshield. And apparently scratches it, because I think I might have a curved scratch on my windshield now. On rainy days, when I remember, I check it before I start driving. This usually works out but yesterday and today it started screeching again about halfway to my destination. Kind of annoying.

I got home around nine o'clock and spent the rest of the night doing the same old thing. Not very exciting. And now I'm going to record my audio journal so I can get to bed at a reasonably decent hour. That hour will probably be after midnight but I don't work until noon tomorrow, so as long as I have time to sleep in I'll be happy.

March 28, 2017

I'm going to forget to mention a lot of the things that happened today. Let's just get that out of the way at the start.

Last night as my head hit the pillow a thought came to mind. If I were to wake up blind, how long would it take for me to get help? I live alone and only have a cell phone, so not a home phone that has buttons that I could feel, which would make calling someone almost impossible. I also only know my Mom's home phone number. I don't know anyone's cell phone number. If I'm not scheduled at work I can go days without contact with anyone, including via text. I could use my computer because I don't have any accessibility stuff set up on it. It's kind of an anxiety-inducing thought. I finally decided that I would be able to find paper and a pen, be able to write “HELP” across the paper, and find my way out to the driveway, where I would sit and wait and hope someone saw the sign and decided to help. I might even be able to stumble over to the nursing home or out to the main road. The problem with that is if it didn't work I would have one hell of a time getting back to my house. It's all kind of terrifying to think about.

Moving on.

This morning at work I got to help shift books because there was a discrepancy found in one of the shelves. That being it had too many shelves, five instead of four. This made the distance between the shelves too small. It was fine when small books were on those shelves but a books was discovered this weekend that couldn't even fit on its side, so that's not good. My boss, the head of technical services, and the assistant director took the shelves apart and then I got to participate in some of the shifting. I'm okay not having to do that on a regular basis. I'll stick with weeding. I did like making all the books look nice, evening them out with the edge of the shelf and putting the display books facing out.

My link to log into our website got messed up somehow but after I got it sorted out I was able to log in and edit the class page for today, adding in links to the physical handouts. I still want to go back in and put links for our resources but that will have to wait for another day.

I showed the librarian in charge of adult programs the Excel schedule I made this weekend of the tech classes and she was as excited about how cool it was as I had been. And still am. I saved a copy of it into our programming folder and she was able to add all of her programs into it so we can see the schedule for the whole department all at once. The spreadsheet is getting ever cooler.

I finally finished watching usability videos for the month. I knocked out half of them sometime earlier in the month and then kind of forgot about it until recently. But now I'm done. Until next month.

Near the end of my shift I directed an older patron to a book and then she came back to ask about a couple other books. One couldn't be found through interlibrary loan and she didn't want us to buy it because she needed it soon. I couldn't find the other book as a physical audiobook but I did find it as an electronic audiobook through one of our digital libraries. She seemed interested in that so I walked her through setting up an account (rather than sending her home and wishing her luck), and I showed her how to get to the website from our website. She doesn't need the book right away so she was going to wait to check it out, so the real test will be if she can get it all figured out when she goes back to it.

As I was finishing things up with the patron one of the other librarian's came over when the patron was asking if she could check out at our desk or if she needed to go downstairs. We told her she had to go downstairs because they didn't trust us upstairs. That started all of us riffing on not being allowed to do things at our jobs that are “out of our pay grade.” And then to perfectly end things, as she was walking by the cart of books that needed to be shelved, she picked one up and read the title. “Not Taco Bell Material.” It was pretty great.

When I got home I ate dinner and spent the rest of the night watching YouTube videos, falling down a few rabbit holes, and playing Absolute Drift. I might be losing interest in Absolute Drift but it is a fun casual game and I want to get better at it. I probably won't but we'll see how it goes.

Now I need to record my audio journal so I can go to bed.

March 27, 2017

Do you ever just really stare at a familiar face until it doesn't make sense anymore? Kind of like saying a word over and over until it loses all meaning. It's interesting.

This morning I slept in and then watched YouTube videos for awhile. For lunch I made scrambled eggs and cornmeal pancakes. I don't know if cornmeal pancakes are my thing. They weren't bad but they were more dense than I was expecting and I think that threw me off a little bit. I don't know that I will be making them again but I am glad I did. Now I need to look into cornbread and see if I have enough cornmeal left over for that.

Eventually I got around to going over to my Mom's house to do laundry. I got it all done in one load, and probably could have made it to next weekend, but I figured I might as well do it just to be safe. While that was going I looked through the book of pictures I checked out about the Japanese internment during WWII. It is such an interesting and odd and unbelievable part of our history that doesn't get much airplay. I also worry that it won't always remain a part of history, but be brought back, for a different race or religion, depending on how things go around the world. Kind of terrifying.

When I got home I made rice and roasted vegetables. I should be good for the rest of the week. I added in sugar snap peas, just to try something new, and they worked out. The original recipe was just carrots, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts, so that is what I stuck with. Then I added in broccoli, and now I've got sugar snap peas. I'd like to throw in other random vegetables from time to time. Keep things interesting.

Tonight I watched the new Resident Evil movie. I feel like I missed a movie at some point. Or maybe it's just been too long since I've seen any of them. Or maybe the new one and the last one don't seamlessly connect and I wasn't paying enough attention. I don't know. I enjoyed the movie, though. The franchise has come a long way since the first movie. I've never really paid much attention to the overall story but if this is truly the last one I might need to marathon all the movies at some point to see if the story makes any sense.

While watching the movie I played more Absolute Drift. I started playing it the other day and I think I forgot to mention it. It was one of the reasons I was up so late. It's kind of addictive. Not as addictive as a Trials game, but it's up there. At some point I want to watch videos of someone who is actually good at the game. The potential for the game to look really cool in the right hands is definitely there. I'm kind of awful, though.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal and then think about going to bed. Sleeping in on a day off when I have to work the next morning is almost always a mistake when it comes to going to bed that night. But sometimes I just can't help myself. Oh well.

March 26, 2017

This morning I did not wake up early enough to make breakfast. That is not surprising. I laid in bed, decided my bed was way better than breakfast, and stayed there until my alarm went off.

At work I did a whole bunch of stuff before we opened. I got there at noon, counted the register, refilled the displays, pulled more books for the bestsellers display, restocked the tax booklets, turned things on, and sharpened a bunch of pencils.

And then I spent most of the rest of my day looking at really old newspapers online. There was a lot of unsuccessful searching and then I hit on something and it snowballed and I ended up with a lot of information about one of the hills I was looking for. I still don't have much information on the other hill but progress is being made.

Other than helping patrons in all the various mediums (in-person, phone, and chat), I talked for a little while about movies with my coworker. One movie turned into the next and the next and the rabbit hole was real. Always good times.

I'm off tomorrow but I might get in trouble when I go in on Tuesday. At the end of the day we are supposed to put the cash drawer in the “safe”, which is really just a locked cabinet that really isn't that secure. Anyway, when I went to get the cash drawer out of the register I hit the decimal button instead of the no sale button and then I couldn't get the register open. I turned it off and on several times, tried a different key, tried the different key positions, and tried all the buttons. Nothing worked and I finally said screw it. To my knowledge no one has ever broken into the library to steal money and I kind of think the money is safer in the register that won't open than in the safe/cabinet where the doors can be pulled out even when it's locked. And the building surrounding the cash register is locked, so we should be good. Famous last words. I just hope I don't get into that much trouble for it.

On my way home I stopped by my Mom's house to pick up an Amazon box and then I came home and made dinner. I ate the rest of my rice and vegetables and I made scrambled eggs. Instead of watching a movie, I spent the night catching up on YouTube videos. Haven't quite made it.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal and then figure out how to delete stuff from my Dropbox folder on my laptop without deleting it everywhere because it is 114GB and I am down to 9MB on the hard drive the folder is on. The pop-up telling me I'm out of space is getting really annoying. At one point I stopped the folder from syncing but that apparently stopped working at some point. So yeah, I need to get that figured out.

As I mentioned previously, I'm off tomorrow. I need to go do some laundry but other than that who knows. I'll probably waste most of the day and not accomplish much.

March 25, 2017

It was really tempting to not get out of bed this morning. But I did, and then I went to work.

My morning was incredibly productive. I somehow managed to come up with the class schedule for next semester. At least a rough draft of it. I even have dates for everything, which I kind of needed to come up with in order to visualize what was actually happening. I also customized an Excel template with a list, that can be sorted by clicking on the day and/or month button, a colorful calendar, and a printable calendar. It is pretty freaking sweet. I didn't even know Excel could do the sorting thing, so I need to figure out how that works so I can do it in the future. I'm happy with it, and it is one less thing I need to stress about. We still need to pick the day for our adulting class and I need to see what my boss thinks of the schedule. I may be trying to do too much.

And there is no genealogy class.

Most of the rest of my day was spent looking at newspapers. I looked at microfilm from the 1920s, 1960s, and 1970s. And I looked at archived newspapers online from the 1920s. And I didn't get anything out of it, other than finding a bunch of papers that didn't have what I wanted in them. So that's something, just not really what I was hoping for. Tomorrow I will continue the search.

Other than that, I answered the phone a bunch, had a couple online chats, and dealt with emails. It was a very chill day, and hopefully tomorrow goes the same way. The only thing out of the norm was an artist who came in and asked if he could draw in the library. He had apparently been asked to leave a couple coffee shops because he was drawing for people and it was distracting or something. I probably should have said no but I told him as long as he didn't ask for money or bother people I was okay with it. I never checked on him but I guess he set up a sign at a table and had several people come over, and according to circulation it went really well and he was very respectful. He even drew a Thank You card for the library, so that was nice. It seems that he is at the beginning of trying to travel around the country and draw in every state. A lofty goal.

When I got home I ate dinner and watched movies. I started with Keanu, starring Keegan-Michael Key, Jordan Peele, and an adorable kitten. It was really funny. Their show was ridiculous and so was their movie, and I liked it. After that I watched Mr. Right with Sam Rockwell and Anna Kendrick. Sam Rockwell was fantastic as always and he and Kendrick both nailed just the right amount of crazy. It might be my new favorite movie. At least at the moment.

It is now one o'clock in the morning and I need to go to bed. Originally I thought about waking up early to make cornmeal pancakes for breakfast but at the moment I like the idea of sleeping in. I might make scrambled eggs if I have the time, though, because I've got a lot of eggs.

And once again, it is time to record my audio journal so I can go to bed.

March 24, 2017

This morning I slept in and then read through a book of photography covering immigration at Ellis Island. Then I read volume one of the comic The Beauty on my computer. Still not a big fan of reading comics on the computer, but the story was interesting. The idea is that there is a new STD that makes the infected beautiful, giving them model-like bodies. And rather than trying to avoid an STD, millions of people want to become infected because the only known side effects are a mild fever and increased appetite. But then people's heads start combusting. Initially, the anti-beauty movement is blamed but it turns out this is the final side effect of the infection. A group of scientists knew this would happen and developed a cure but were fired and branded criminals because the pharmaceutical company wanted to release medicine that would prevent the combusting head thing but wouldn't cure people because they wanted them to keep buying the medicine. Something shady and I'm sure a company would never do that in real life. Now I need to continue the series so I can see what happens.

After that I ate lunch, took a shower, and then headed to my Mom's house to do laundry. While that happened I finished watching Troy and read through a book of photographs from WWII. One of the pictures shows a bunch of German school children wearing gas masks lined up in the street for a practice drill. It reminded me of the episode of Doctor Who where the kids have gas masks grafted to their faces saying “Are you my mummy?” Super creepy.

Tonight was Chipotle night. The lack of crowd was nice but the food was just so-so. After dinner we watched videos, talked, and my Mom gave us a few things she got for us on her vacation. Around 7:30PM I loaded up my laundry and headed home.

I spent the rest of my night not really doing much. I mainly just watched YouTube videos and Power Rangers. I learned that the lead actress in iZombie was actually the yellow ranger in the RPM series. The red ranger in the same series plays the druggie neighbor in Jessica Jones on Netflix. Small ranger world. The black ranger also looks familiar but I can't tell if it is just because he looks like Superman from Smallville or if it is from something else.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do at work tomorrow. I think my main goal for this weekend is to come up with the class schedule for next semester. I believe one thing that won't be appearing on the schedule, if I get final say, is the genealogy class. I got an email from the lady at the genealogical society yesterday asking about promotion, because she hadn't seen any, and wanting to know how many people were signed up. I let her know how many people had signed up and got the information about the advertising of the class from the PR lady. She emailed me back today saying how disappointed she was with the lack of promotion and blah blah blah. I forwarded that email to the PR lady and she replied to the genealogical society lady, apologizing and saying it would be better in the future. The genealogical society lady was disappointed with the attendance at the class last semester and is now disappointed again. I can understand her frustration but at the same time, asking her to do the class at the library is mutually beneficial. And she acts like we should be bending over backwards in appreciation for the favor she is doing for us. I find that annoying. And I don't like how she talked to us in the email today. So, I plan on taking a break from the genealogy class next semester, and maybe the following semester. If people are interested we can direct them to the genealogical society. A break will be good for everyone and maybe it will build more interest in the class when we do offer it again.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal and go to bed.

March 23, 2017

This was a note kind of day, so of course I didn't take any.

I got to sleep in today and woke up without an alarm. And I eventually went to work.

I finished weeding my last non-fiction section today. And I didn't check out any of the books. The other two librarians who were still weeding were also able to finish today so we are now completely done weeding non-fiction. It's been a long process, spanning an entire floor filled with thousands of books, and we're done. With the non-fiction. Next we start on large print.

I got all the books pulled before I went to lunch and eventually got around to actually withdrawing them. I can't remember all the things that distracted me from doing this but my last four hours at work were basically at the desk so I had plenty of time to get things done. I was only scheduled for three hours with an hour off after the first two, but the librarian scheduled at the desk had to set up for a program tonight so I hung around.

One of the other librarians brought up the idea of coming up with new book titles by taking out one letter from the original title. The original example she gave was Oliver Twist becoming Liver Twist. And then I spent way too much time coming up with new titles. Some of my favorites were Rankrenstein and Madame Ovary. I also liked what The Count of Monte Cristo became but it was very inappropriate.

I did other things today but it's almost two o'clock in the morning so lets move this along.

The coworker I was covering for got there at 6:45PM, which was good because we were all a little concerned that he wouldn't make it back and that I would have to work the rest of the night. He told me the story of what happened and apologized several times and thanked me for covering. I knew it was something out of his control and, having always been the responsible person in most situations, I could relate to his story. I'm just glad I didn't have to stay past seven o'clock because I was getting hungry.

When I got home I ate dinner and watched Power Rangers. I started just in time to catch the first episode of the Mystic Force series. It was nice getting the background information and not just jumping into the middle of a series. It didn't make it any less ridiculous, especially the yellow ranger who could have excavator shovels for hands, but it was nice to have the added context. I also watched the Honest Trailer for the old Power Rangers movie (recommended by a coworker) and now I really want to see that movie. Along with the new movie.

I also dove into Tera a little more deeply than I have in awhile. And that was a lot of fun. My only problem is I have screwed up the buttons for some of my attacks. I have accidentally dragged some of them off the hotbar and I can't remember what order they were in. Or even which ones I lost. I just know that it doesn't feel right when I go through them. Oh well.

And now it is somehow after two o'clock in the morning. I need to record my audio journal and go to bed.

March 22, 2017

I slept in this morning, took a shower, watched Power Rangers, ate lunch, and then went to work.

Not too long after getting to work I had my first real angry patron interaction at the library. She wasn't actually mad at me but I'm still counting it. According to her, in the past two days she has had four bad interactions with the new girl in the tech center. To be fair to the new girl, these were her first two days in the tech center and she had the pleasure of dealing with this lovely patron.

The patron was sent up to me by Circulation and she wanted to complain. I showed her our opinion form that she could fill out, which she didn't seem very interested in. When she asked if there was anything I could do, I said I could listen to her and pass the information along to admin, or she could talk to admin but she would need to wait until they got back from lunch.

She eventually launched into her grievances. According to her the new girl didn't know how to help her when she wanted to change her Word document to single-space, couldn't help her with something involving her email, couldn't help her with her flash drive, and something else. She was also very annoyed that the new girl always seemed to be typing something and didn't pay enough attention to what was going on around her. The Word thing is a little concerning but the patron admitted that she wasn't very tech literate herself, so I can only take her description of the situation with a grain of salt. Part of me thinks she may have been unable to properly explain her own problem in the first place, which probably confused the new girl, and the patron probably thinks they were easy problems to fix now that she has seen how they were fixed. If that makes sense. Also, you can tell the patron just really doesn't like the new girl when she brought up the typing. In a tech center filled with computers. Each with their own keyboard. It reminded me of the meme about hating someone so much that everything about them annoys you, leading to “Look at that bitch over there, eating those crackers like she owns the place.” The patron has definitely reached the cracker level.

About halfway through the interaction my fellow librarian came over and added in her take on the situation, probably further defusing things. I was dealing with it fine (I think) because I kind of like when people get angry and behave poorly in public, but it is always good to have backup. The best part about the interaction was when the patron brought up the fact that she is a taxpayer and pays our salaries. I refrained from asking her for a raise. I had heard that people would throw around the taxpayer thing but I always kind of thought it was a myth. But nope. Turns out it actually happens.

During the conversation I reiterated that it was only the new girl's second day and that the patron was welcome to use the computers on the second floor where we would be able to help her. At least then when she got upset we would actually know both sides. In the end, she really just wanted to vent her frustration, which I have also heard is a typical angry patron thing. They don't really want to do anything about the situation but they do want to blow off some steam, by yelling at a stranger just doing their job.

Afterward the other librarian and I talked to the assistant director about it because our boss is gone the rest of the week. Later on the head of IT talked to the assistant director and then came over to talk to me. He had apparently helped out with one of the issue yesterday. He said he was familiar with the patron and that she had come in with a chip on her shoulder yesterday, pretty much just waiting for anything to go wrong so she could complain. There are just those people in the world.

Throughout the day we had several interesting reference questions and interactions with patrons. It was like a full moon or something. It was kind of crazy.

Thankfully things calmed down a little tonight. I only had to wake up one sleeper. I was also able to finally start the personalized reading list that I have attempted to start several times this week, and I started my new weeding list. I made it to page three or four and pulled fifty books. Fifty-one if you count the one I checked out because I can't help myself.

When I got home I ate some more of the homemade bread my sister made me and watched YouTube videos to unwind. And now I am writing this. Next, I will be recording my audio journal and then going to bed. I'm pretty excited about that last part.

Tomorrow I was originally supposed to work a slightly weird schedule, going in at 10:00AM and getting off at 5:30PM, because I work the weekend and have to make up for working nine and a half hours on Saturday. Then we got a call from one of our coworkers who is supposed to work at 5:30PM tomorrow but he is currently in Colorado and doesn't think he'll be able to come to work until 7:00PM. So now I'm going in at 11:30AM and working until 7:00PM. Not really a big deal but it did mean I had to move Chipotle night to Friday. Life goes on.

March 21, 2017

This morning started much like yesterday, and then I once again went to work.

It was an interesting day. I was at the library for eight hours but I didn't seem to accomplish much. I'm actually having a hard time remembering how most of the day passed. I spent a decent amount of time in Excel. I compiled the feedback from classes on where people had heard about the class and what classes they want in the future. The goal is to use this information to help come up with the schedule for next semester, which I've got about two weeks to figure out. Doable, if I would just do it. I also got my new/last weeding list for nonfiction so I spent time editing that and printing it out. Once we're done with nonfiction we're moving to large print.

This afternoon we had our tech drop-in and it was a bit of a fail, most likely due to it being Spring Break week. Hopefully. We had one person show up in the last ten minutes and his issue was out of the scope of what we could do. He had a laptop that had been dropped and the screen was completely broken and he was wanting information on repairing the screen and getting information off of the hard drive. We advised him that repairing the screen probably wouldn't be worth it, if it were even possible, and told him about hard drive docks that he could use to get the information off the hard drive. I also told him that before he bought anything he could try plugging the laptop into his TV just to make sure the hard drive was still working. It would suck to get a dock just to find out that hard drive had broken along with the screen.

So the volunteer and I sat there for an hour and fifty minutes and then helped one person for five minutes. Not the most productive use of our time. But, I had a good conversation with the volunteer about buying houses, because he and his wife just bought one, and we talked a lot about video games, because it turns out he's a big PC gamer. So at least something good came out of it.

And that was my day at work. What I remember of it anyway. I helped the occasional patron, talked about work stuff with my coworkers, and talked about a lot of non-work stuff with my coworkers.

When I got off work I went to my Mom's house to feed the dogs and then I started packing up my stuff. She wasn't supposed to get back until tomorrow but the timetable got moved up and she got back at seven o'clock tonight. Almost on the dot, which was impressive.

My new debit card came so when I got home I updated my PayPal account. That ended up being a bit of a struggle because the only phone number it would recognize was my Mom's home phone, so it became a team effort. I was able to get in the other day and set my cell phone as my primary number but apparently that wasn't good enough. I was able to get it sorted out in the end, which is good because I was able to order a new pair of green Chucks for work.

I caught up on YouTube videos and watched some more Power Rangers. They are on Ninja Storm which is... interesting. It's not actually that bad relative to the other seasons I have seen but their sensei is a CGI gerbil that just looks ridiculous. Horribly animated CGI morphing cutscenes are one thing but an important character seems unnecessary. I actually used the new clipping feature for the first time tonight to save a clip of the gerbil saying he was going to use his telepathic ninja powers to communicate with the rangers. It was just too ridiculous.

And it is now 11:30PM because I need getting distracted, so I'm going to record my audio journal real quick and go to bed. Thankfully I don't have to go in until noon tomorrow.

March 20, 2017

 This morning I woke up at 6:30AM, which is a half an hour earlier than normal. I ended up laying in bed for half an hour after my alarm went off, but I always do that, so I was still a half an hour ahead. I then took a shower and then went up to let the dogs out and feed them. Following that I made my lunch, ate breakfast, got dressed, and took the trash out.

At work today I probably should have taken notes. Not because there was a lot going on but because it was that level of uneventful that is very forgettable. I spent a lot of time weeding and was able to finish my most recent section.

When I was on desk I spent my time making alternative signs for our audiobook display. It's not my display but we just started it and I came up with the sign, which was a cute dog with big ears and a paw coming up to one of the ears as if it is trying to listen better. Today it was deemed “too wacky” and not professional enough by the PR lady. That's kind of annoying because everyone seems to like it. And we've had plenty of “wacky” signs in the past. I am a little worried this is going to lead to more restrictions in the future. It's already hard enough trying to be creative with the display template. My leading theory is she just doesn't like dogs, because I tried putting a tiny picture of a corgi puppy with the tax forms and that was also deemed not professional. I really wanted to change the audiobook sign to a cat just to test my dog theory. But I didn't. I made one with a baby, two with earn horns (which will almost certainly be rejected), one that is a clip art outline turned on its side of a hand next to an ear, and one that is just a bunch of different drawings of ears. We'll see if any of them are acceptable.

And other than that I helped the occasional patron, restocked both of my displays, and looked at a couple issues of BookPage magazine.

After work I went to my Mom's house to feed the dogs and around seven o'clock went to my house to eat dinner and record my audio journal. When that was done and the video was uploaded I came back to my Mom's house. I spent the rest of the night looking at boots and watching a Twitch stream of Vern watching the Power Rangers marathon. He eventually wanted to play games but the chat wanted to keep watching Power Rangers, so he currently has the majority of his screen the Power Rangers, he is in the lower right corner, he is playing League of Legends in the upper right corner, and he has his chat in between the two so he can actually see it. It's an interesting setup. As for the Power Rangers, we have made it to Wild Force, which is the season with the red ranger who was recently convicted of killing his roommate with a sword. The only appropriate way for a Power Ranger to kill anyone in real life.

I think after this episode I'm going to go to bed. I'm freaking tired and I have to wake up in the morning. Also, one of the dogs just farted in their sleep. It smells awful right now. All the more reason to escape to my room and my bed.

March 19, 2017

 This morning I woke up around ten o'clock when my sister came over to take care of the cats. I then fed the dogs and watched some YouTube videos and researched boots for awhile. I'm in a mood again where I want to buy boots. Probably because I don't currently have access to a debit card so I can't actually buy them online. I think if I ever decide to pull the trigger I should probably go try them on first. It will save a lot of time because it would probably take a few pairs, shipping back and forth, before I got the right size online. And I doubt I buy them any time soon but it is fun to look.

For lunch I had scrambled eggs and day-old bread from Jimmy Johns. Then I got ready and around 1:45PM I made it over to my Dad's house. The first hurdle was getting logged into the laptop. There was a note card with a bunch of possible usernames and passwords on it, which my step-mom had written down when she originally got the laptop a few years ago (and then put it in the closet). Once that was figured out I created an online account for their internet service so I could download the free anti-virus software suite they provide. Then there was a lot of updates for Windows. Around 4:30PM I finally paused that and installed my Dad's tax software, which was the main reason for going over there. And then it was back to the Windows updates. I ended up having to call it a day at 5:45PM and my Dad texted me two hours later to tell me it had finally finished.

After leaving I went back to my Mom's house to feed the dogs. Then I went to my house so I could make dinner. I roasted vegetables and made brown rice. My ratio was a little off and there was too much rice but the rice came out perfectly, so there's that. Other than tasting like brown rice.

While I ate dinner I watched Vern play another drinking game with Power Rangers. They were on the Lightspeed Rescue series and it was pretty awful. Maybe it was just because it didn't have the nostalgia of my youth attached to it, but I'm pretty sure that's not it. It was just bad.

After dinner I cleaned dished and then headed back to my Mom's house. Now I'm writing this and watching Sisters. I missed however much of the beginning but it has been really funny so far.

This weekend I wanted to play a video game and read a couple of the books I have checked out. I did neither of those things, so the weekend was a bit of a fail in that respect. But I accomplished other things, like cooking and helping my Dad and watched a lot of Power Rangers.

Now I think I'm going to look at some more boots while I watch the end of Sisters.

March 18, 2017

 I slept in this morning and then eventually got up. Because that's generally what happens after one wakes up. With the rest of the morning I watched YouTube videos and Power Rangers and maybe did some other things. Then I took a shower, ate lunch, and loaded up my car like I was moving back home.

After my car was unloaded and my laundry was started, I finally got around to doing my taxes. I feel like it took longer than it should but I was also doing laundry at the same time. I also had to figure out the whole house thing which was a change from last year. It really wasn't that much harder but I had two mortgage lenders, because the bank I went through transferred it after the first payment I think. I was unsure of the first account number and then dove deep into over thinking it. But I got it done and I'll be getting a decent return, so hooray for that.

I finished my taxes around 5:30PM and then fed the dogs and watched YouTube videos while I waited for my laundry to finish. Around seven o'clock I went to get dinner. I am trying to eat a little healthier so I went with Jimmy John's. Maybe not entirely healthy but better than Sonic.

I ate dinner at my house and started watching Hacksaw Ridge, a movie I have wanted to see since the first trailer came out. It was a very intense movie. It didn't try to romanticize war, which I appreciated. It showed how graphic and devastating war is. I appreciated that. And it was a good movie. I enjoyed it.

I paused the movie around ten o'clock so I could go to the grocery store. I stocked up on vegetables, brown rice, and some other stuff, including cornmeal because I want to try cornmeal pancakes. The kid in front of me at the register was riding a hoverboard, or whatever those two-wheeled balance things are. Interesting character.

When I got back to my house I unloaded my groceries, recorded my audio journal, and then finished watching Hacksaw Ridge while my video uploaded. And then I headed back to my Mom's house. I watched a few YouTube videos while also watching the end of The Breakfast Club and now Sixteen Candles is on. But I'm going to go to bed because it is one o'clock in the morning.

March 17, 2017

 Today was a note-taking kind of day. I should have taken them.

On my way to work and to lunch and then back home I listened to Flogging Molly. It was the only Irishy music I had access to. I also wore a green shirt, my green jacket, and my orange Chucks (just to look more like Ireland's flag).

My main takeaway from today was that St. Patrick's Day is way better in a school because kids are way better at wearing green. It was a really quiet day but even out of the patrons I saw, only a few of them were wearing green. Kind of disappointing.

I got my new weeding list today and got it all edited the way I like and printed out. I accidentally sent it to the copier in the admin office so it came out in color, which meant all my highlighted rows were green instead of grey. A happy accident. I also got a little bit of a start on actually weeding a couple times throughout the day. A short time after the second time I went out to weed my friend found me. She's been in town this week to meet her new nephew. Her boyfriend got a little lost, accidentally going to the third floor and then the basement, but he eventually found us and we stood around and talked until about five minutes before I had to leave, so I didn't get a lot of weeding done.

I watched usability videos for the first time this month and I think got pretty close to finishing. Not close enough but I made a decent dent.

I was on desk for two hours straight at one point and the first hour disappeared. This is where the notes would have helped because I can't remember what all happened that made that time disappear. I walked a couple different patrons to books, I answered emails and phone calls. There was also a person in chat that was either at work and not supposed to be chatting or didn't get the concept because she would send a message and then log out. She was wanting a list of books and her last message was asking us to email her the list. She was interested in the nominees for the Hugo awards but I found out voting for the nominees was open through the end of the day and the actual nominees wouldn't be announced until later this year. I found a website that had compiled a list of possible nominees and I was going to just send her that link in chat but she kept logging out. And then she sent a personalized reading list request that she wants themed around the Hugo awards. She was a bit much.

The old regular curmudgeon told me a St. Patrick's Day story today. He went to the Iditarod in Alaska one year and he got there during a St. Patrick's Day parade. There were apparently a lot of redheads in short skirts and he said ever since than he hasn't been able to enjoy St. Patrick's Day because it can't live up to that parade. He's a very random old man.

I know that other things happened at work today but I can't remember anything else.

Tonight I watched YouTube videos and Power Rangers. I started the evening watching a streamer on Twitch playing a drinking game based on the show. It was pretty funny. The best rules were: a sip for every flip, one drink every time Justin figures something out, two drinks every time a life lesson is subtly thrown in, and three drinks every time one of the rangers isn't wearing their ranger color in an outfit or any time a new ranger is introduced. That last one screwed him a little bit because during one of the episodes all five of the rangers changed. It was funny.

It is now midnight so I am going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed. My mom is going out of town tomorrow so I will once again have to take a bunch of crap over there, along with my laundry, because I'll be sleeping there at least through Tuesday. At some point this weekend my dad wants help with his computer and I also want to finally do my taxes. I should have gotten those finished awhile ago.

March 16, 2017

 Today is not going to be a very exciting entry. Not that any of my entries are particularly exciting.

The majority of my time at work was spent weeding. When I wasn't on the desk I was weeding and when I was on the desk I was processing the books I had pulled from the shelves.

When I wasn't doing weeding things I successfully put a dent in the stack of magazines in my inbox. I went from seven magazines down to just one, and I'm no longer trapped in 2016 because the last magazine I have is the February issue of Library Journal. Progress.

And that was my day at work. I finished my weeding list of nearly seven hundred books and I made it through six magazines that have been sitting in my inbox forever. Oh, and I ordered more tax books. And helped the occasional patron. But that was it. It was a very chill day and I'm okay with that.

When I got home I ate leftover Chipotle and watched Power Rangers on Twitch for pretty much the entire night. Still a ridiculous show but I can't stop watching.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal and go to bed.

March 15, 2017

 This morning when I got to work I did all the opening stuff. And once we had opened I headed upstairs because I had a bunch of free time. I called my homebound patrons, finished editing my new weeding list, updated the attendance records and collected the feedback from the class yesterday, and checked on the feedback from the tutorial class I just finished. I was surprisingly productive. After my walkthrough I started weeding my new section until I had to go to lunch.

When I got back it was time for homebound. I loaded up the book carts and then we loaded up the van and headed out. After our first stop we made a detour to give some stuff to the historical society. There was a very eager intern right inside the door who thought we were there to see the museum. When we mentioned we were just dropping something off she pulled out a form and my coworker had to fill it out. It was super in-depth and felt like she was having to sign over her firstborn, just to give them something they had requested.

The rest of the deliveries were uneventful. On the way back to the library we had to get gas and went to the same station I had my card number stolen at last week. The other librarian told me that skimmers had only been found at that station and the same one across town. Also, the skimmers were actually inside the gas pumps, not just attached outside, which made me feel better because there was really nothing I could have done about it.

When we got back and got all the books ready to be checked in, I worked on updating all the spreadsheets with the comments I got from the patrons. I got a lot of feedback this month which is always appreciated.

I spent my last hour at work on the desk. Most of that time, outside of helping patrons, was spent withdrawing the books I pulled earlier. I didn't make it through all of them because I kept getting distracted by them. I'm deep in the WWII section and all of the books are interesting. I ended up checking out two and added several more to my cart. Good grief.

I ended up staying about fifteen minutes late because I got into a conversation with my coworkers that was incredibly entertaining and very random. It is really cool having a job I really like and having coworkers I really like to work with. I just hope in a couple months when one of the librarians moves that we hire someone just as likeable. It's going to be difficult.

There was a long line at Chipotle but it was mostly a staffing issue, not a crowd issue. There were only a few workers on the line, one of which was new, and there was a new girl on the register. The last part was the most annoying because she didn't ring it up like they normally do so I had to use two twenties instead of the near-perfect change I had brought, based on the total I'm used to.

After dinner we watched YouTube videos and my mom actually commented that there should have been more. Usually she gets bored halfway through. I left around eight o'clock and stopped by Target on the way home to get bread and some other things.

I watched YouTube videos when I got home until I discovered that Twitch is marathoning all 831 episodes of Power Rangers. I didn't even know there were that many. The cheesiness is so addictive. The new movie coming out actually looks pretty good, and not just in the cheesy way, although I'm sure it'll be plenty awkward.

Now I'm going to take a break from the Power Rangers so I can record my audio journal.

March 14, 2017

 This morning it was freezing outside and not too long after arriving at work it looked like a snow globe outside. The snow didn't stick to the ground but it was coming down in big flakes that almost looked fake.

I had the thought to take notes today but then convinced myself that I would remember everything. I do not remember everything. This morning I finished up my homebound stuff. That included pulling books for my final patron and updating the spreadsheets for all my patrons.

I also pulled books for both of my displays, which are doing relatively well this month. The bestsellers display doesn't really count because that one already does well. I try to change it up by adding a decent amount of non-fiction, so that hurts my numbers a little bit probably, but it's still doing alright.

I resolved the issue I started troubleshooting last night regarding the patron who couldn't return a few ebooks. Turns out with that service our IT people can log in on the admin side and manually delete books, which they did, and all was well.

I also finished my weeding section. I technically finished yesterday but I had a few oversize books to pull. I also went through the entire list again and doublechecked all the books that I had marked as checked out in the catalog. The ones that were “out” and still had a last activity date from years ago I marked as missing.

This afternoon I got a new weeding list and spent a decent amount of time editing the raw spreadsheet to get it ready. I reordered the columns, did some math, marked the ones that couldn't be weeded because they are too new, and started going through and bolding the ones I will be weeding. I still need to finish that last part, reorder the list based on the Dewey number, and do some general formatting to make it all look better. And then I'll print it off and get started. It's got somewhere over 600 books on it. That's a lot of books.

Immediately following lunch we had the Pinterest class. I was just there as support but was able to jump in every now and then and help out. I didn't check the feedback yet but I think the class went relatively well. Hopefully the feedback backs me up on that.

And that was pretty much my day. All that I remember of it anyway.

When I got home I had dinner, which included a frozen meal. I haven't had one of those in awhile. I debated making pasta but I didn't want to be stuck with that for the next week. The meal I microwaved was pasta but in a one-meal size.

With the rest of my night I did nothing but watching YouTube videos, read articles, and click around the internet. One of these I'll do something more interesting with my time away from work.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed. I ended up staying up until one o'clock last night watching Homefront so I'm a little tired. And I open tomorrow so I would like to get to bed at a decent time tonight.

March 13, 2017

 I forgot to mention this yesterday but the newspaper got my name correct on my article. Second time's the charm apparently.

This morning I slept in and it was great. Then I went to work.

I had a few free hours so I got back to weeding. It's been over a month since I've weeded. I was back in my original section, which includes old history books. I think I might be allergic. Or maybe the only people who check out these books live in houses full of cats. By the end of the day I had weeded over eighty books. It would have been more but I also added about ten more to my to-read list. I'm definitely in an area of weakness. And I'm about to start on the very next section, which is just going to be a continuation of things I want to read.

Pulling the books and processing them was pretty much my day. When I was on desk before my dinner break I was going to process the books but I got a bit overrun with other work stuff. I had non-stop chats, phone calls, and patrons at the desk. It was kind of nuts.

Tonight I processed all the books, updated the website for tomorrow's class, and started working on the personalized reading list I agreed to last week. I also got involved with a troubleshooting questions that started as a phone call and turned into several emails. And it will continue to a new day because I ran out of time tonight. It is also looking like it might be a bigger problem than I am able to solve.

When I got home I ate some chips and dip. I have also taken far too long writing this because I am also watching The Losers, a movie I completely forgot about until last night when I got lost in a YouTube rabbit hole of short clips of the best fight scenes in movies. It's a pretty great movie. The only downside is they left it open for a sequel but it apparently didn't perform well enough to earn one.

It is now eleven o'clock and I'm going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed.

March 12, 2017

 Today was fairly uneventful so this will go quick.

I kind of slept in a little bit and eventually made pancakes and eggs for brunch. Throughout the day, while I was cooking, doing dishes, and ironing, I started listening to an audiobook. I hope I can stick with it and actually finish it because I am enjoying it so far.

Most of my day was spent watching YouTube videos and playing video games. I downloaded and played Letter Quest for the first time. I can't remember how long ago I got it, probably in a bundle, but today was the day. It's a turn-based spelling game where you come up against enemies and have to spell words to defeat them. That's an accurate description but probably doesn't make it sound that fun. But it is fun.

I jumped into No Man's Sky for a little bit for the first time in a long time. Since I last played they introduced a lot of stuff and it turns out I couldn't be bothered to get into any of it. I want to at some point but it would probably be best to start over. And you can't have different saves under the same gamemode. I think I might just make a run to the center of the universe just to see the end and then start again. That's a bit ambitious and probably won't happen. One thing I did do was get pulled into a space battle against pirates, and it turns out those are still awful. In general, flying and controlling the spaceship isn't that fun. It is worse in space while being shot at from multiple directions, all while constantly being buffeted around by the anti-collision system because you're “too close” to the big freighters. It's annoying. It would be great if they could make it fun but they haven't yet, so it would be nice if they could just abandon it until they can.

Tonight I finished my roasted vegetables and rice leftovers. I also made more avocado and pistachio dip. I think that will be the last batch I make for awhile. I still like it but I need to move on to other things.

After dinner I watched the new XXX movie. I don't really remember the first movie, and I'm almost certain I never saw the second one, but I liked the new one. They obviously didn't take themselves seriously and it was just a good, cheesy action movie. I also liked Ruby Rose better in this than the new John Wick movie.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal and then maybe watch another movie. I just checked and I don't go in until noon tomorrow so I can afford to stay up late. Although I will probably regret that decision later in the week when it throws off my sleep schedule.

March 11, 2017

 Well, last night I had to cancel my debit card. My Dad sent out a message that the local police department had seen several instances of skimmers being used at gas stations around town. I got gas earlier this week so I decided to check my account. I noticed it first in Mint as a few transactions at Wal-Mart in three different towns on the same day I got gas, and then I verified it by logging into my bank account. Following that I called my bank and canceled my card. The lady said I would get a new one in the mail in the next seven to ten days and I would also get a list of charges so I could mark the ones that were fraudulent and get my money back. More than anything I'm annoyed because I was finally starting to get used to my card number and now I'm going to get a new one.

I was “lucky” in that whoever stole my card information only spent around a hundred bucks, and that they spent it at Wal-Mart, which I haven't been to in years so it stood out pretty clearly, even if I hadn't noticed the different towns. I was also reminded that I am paying for something at work that is supposed to monitor this sort of thing and let me know when something happens. Maybe it requires a certain amount to be spent in order to trigger suspicion. Regardless, I'm going to have to look into the service and see if it is really worth however much I'm spending on it.

Today it snowed. I think it was earlier this week that we got up to the mid-70s, and today it snowed an inch. Weather is weird.

Around 12:30PM I packed up and headed over to my Mom's house to do laundry. While that was happening I watched lecture videos and worked on assignments and discussion posts. It took me several hours but I managed to get everything done, which means I'm completely done with the class, and that means I can move on with my life. I still need to check back to get feedback on everything but I'm done with the work stuff. Although I should probably still take notes on all the lectures, but that can happen later.

Tonight I played a lot of You Must Build A Boat and started watching Black Lagoon. I made it through the first season and I am liking it so far. My favorite character is the bar owner who's bar repeatedly gets destroyed.

It is now after midnight, and with the time change it is actually after one o'clock, so I need to record my audio journal and go to bed. Tomorrow is the day we'll find out if the newspaper spells my name right. My fingers are crossed but I'm not holding my breath.

March 10, 2017

 This morning I remembered that I had agreed to pick my mom up from the mechanic and take her to work. And I remembered soon enough that I was able to leave the house five minutes early, which turned out to be the perfect amount of time.

Today at work I did things. Probably should have taken notes but I didn't. The big achievement of my day was almost finishing my homebound stuff. I pulled the books for all but one of my patrons, got all the bookmarks made and put in the books, and got them bagged up. On Monday all I'll have to do is pull books for the last patron and label my bags. I'm feeling good about it.

I updated the class website for next week, started working on the handout, and took a bunch of screenshots of the website just in case.

I worked a little bit on my online class. I started watching a lecture and taking notes but didn't manage to finish it. I also started working on one of the discussion posts but didn't get it posted and it is due this weekend so I'll have to redo it because I didn't email it to myself. I also need to finish all the other stuff that is due this week. That is my plan tomorrow while my laundry is going. It will be nice to have a little break once this class is over. And then at the end of the month I'll be taking a webinar and then give a talk on it to a bunch of people. Can't wait.

I helped patrons today with printing, microfilm, their accounts, and random other questions. A successful day of reference librarianing.

And I think that was about it. It was a fairly slow and quiet day, which allowed me to get things done. Always appreciated. I also didn't tell anyone that I stayed an extra half hour last night, which is good because I didn't finish my homebound stuff until right before six o'clock.

When I got home tonight I ate dinner and did the usual thing. One of my fellow librarian's let me borrow the anime Black Lagoon and I am looking forward to watching it but I've been really behind on YouTube videos. I need to watch fewer YouTube videos. Anyway, I plan on getting to Black Lagoon this weekend. Maybe tomorrow night if I can get all my homework done.

It is only 10:30PM right now but it feels much later. I've also had a headache all night, so that doesn't help. I'm going to record my audio journal and then go to bed. And my fingers are crossed that I sleep off the headache. Waking up with a headache is kind of the worst.

March 9, 2017

 Sleeping in this morning was really nice. I could have stayed in bed another hour or three but I got up and did all the things I do before going to work.

When I got to work my first project was working on homebound lists and I came very close to finishing. By the end of the day I did manage to technically finish my lists. I still have the one patron who I go directly to the shelves to pick books for, and I need to pick out DVDs for another patron. But other than that, I'm good.

I had my meeting with one of the IT people today who has been making the training stuff that I was kind of volunteered to do. I don't really care because it means less work for me. I was just shocked that after over a month of trying I finally got a meeting with one of them. And it went well. She showed me what she had been working on and we discussed how the training would happen. I think it's all good, mostly because it's one less thing that I have to do, as long as it goes well.

I went up to talk with the PR lady about website stuff and she was taking a break in the breakroom with one of her volunteers and the former tech center worker but now technical services person. I think it was the first time I have been in the breakroom since my first week of work. And kind of my first real break since almost that long. It was kind of nice to just sit down and not be in a work setting for a little bit.

After a little while my boss stopped by to get water but we ended up talking about the WWII memorial meeting that she went to this morning. It was originally going to be another project I got involved in but she said that the feeling she got from the meeting was that the library was kind of pulled in very late in the process and the ideas they had for library involvement could really be better handled by other people. So that's another project I no longer have.

When that conversation was over I went and talked to the PR lady about the website stuff. She made a page for next weeks tech class and I think she's going to get the other stuff sorted out soon. Now that I have a page for it I need to start putting links there. I'm not sure what to put there but I'll come up with something. At the very least I'll put the handout there. Which I still need to make.

On my way back from dinner I saw two crows going after a hawk in mid-air over the highway. No idea what that was all about but it was interesting to see.

My workshop was tonight and I think it went pretty well. It also went unexpectedly. I pushed the four tables in the room together, lined it all with books and put a few scattered around as obstacles. I also included various book stands as things to drive through and around. And on the floor I set up the markers as something to knock over or drive around.

The only person to sign up was my fellow librarian's husband and the two patrons who I heard were interested in coming didn't actually come. One of those patrons was an 84 year old man who stopped by the desk today. There was one walk-in who played with the Sphero a little bit and we talked about robots and STEM and STEAM for a bit but then we ended up spending most of his time there talking about starting a podcast because that was something he was interested in. Coincidentally I just made a tutorial video on starting a podcast and have gotten into recording an audio journal every day, so I could actually have an intelligent conversation with him about it. He also expressed interest in coming to the workshop next month.

The librarian's husband got to spend a lot of time working on different programs but throughout the workshop we had three people from circulation stop by on their break to check things out. Two out of the three actually drove the robot around a little bit so that was cool. I also spoke with two of them for more than just a “hello” for the first time so that was cool. I think I was more social because I was in my public face mode, which I can turn on when I'm teaching a class or interacting with strangers for work-related things. Overall I'll say the program was a success. It would have been better if I had gotten a second robot from the teen librarian but I think she forgot about it and I didn't think about it until after she had left.

At the end of the night there was a kid who tried to call his mom for a ride but wasn't able to get through. He ended up texting her but he was still waiting outside after we closed so I stayed with him and sent everyone else home. After a couple minutes of awkward silence I just started asking him questions because it's been awhile since I've gotten to talk to a kid. And it turns out it's a small world because the kid this year just started going to the elementary school I worked at for the last four years. That was super helpful because I was able to start asking him questions and name-dropping some teachers which I think made him feel more comfortable. We talked about the subjects he liked and didn't like and I learned that his birthday is on Saturday. While we talked he started playing a game on his tablet. It was PewDiePie's Tuber Simulator. I didn't even know PewDiePie had a game but it doesn't surprise me. I started asking questions about it to get the kid to talk more, because kids are always up for talking about the games they're playing. I also showed him Flop Rocket on my phone because that's the addictive game I always go back to, and he seemed pretty interested in it. After he still hadn't heard back from his mom I let him borrow my phone so he could call again and managed to get her. A little before 9:30PM his mom showed up and he thanked me for waited with him. He's the same kid who was in over the summer, often until close, and I had a little interaction with him then but it was nice getting to know him a little better. I'm also going to do my best not to mention the fact that I was there a half hour after work to my boss because then I'll have to make up that time. That would mean leaving early, which means less time to work on things, and I have a lot of things to work on, so I'm going to try and keep it quiet.

When I got home I inked up my new pen which arrived in the mail from Japan today. I bought it almost a month ago I think on Amazon but it still had to ship from Japan so it took awhile. It's the same pen I currently carry with me everyday, the Pilot Prera, but this one is a clear demonstrator with a light green end and tip. It looks really cool. I like that I can see my ink level but I especially like that I can see the color of the ink in the feed. And I went with the green ink I got at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter which is pretty much a perfect match for the green on the pen. I'm happy with the purchase.

I then watched YouTube videos. And it has taken me way too long to write this because I kept getting distracted by videos. It is now after 11:30PM and I still need to record my audio journal. So I'm going to go do that so I can go to bed.

March 8, 2017

 I forgot that yesterday I also took notes on one of the lectures for my class. To be fair, it was one of the videos from last week, because I'm still behind, and that fact is still a bit stressful, but I'm getting there.

Today was another one of those days that just kind of happened. Those seem to be popping up more frequently. Most of it seems to have just kind of passed in a blur. The best part of the day happened shortly after we opened thanks to one of our regulars, the old curmudgeon who likes to complain about kids. The first funny thing he said was that he was at a frat house (I'm assuming he's some sort of house dad or maintenance guy or something) and said they had a fish tank that they obviously don't take care of. He told me that a couple days ago he scooped out the gold fish and threw in some carrots and no one had noticed yet. That's pretty good. The best thing, however, was that he told me he doesn't believe we went to the moon. My initial thought was that he probably believes some random conspiracy theory. He caught me off guard with his real reason, which was that he worked at Cape Canaveral for two years, and as he put it “They were a bunch of idiots”, so there is no way they could have gotten to the moon. That's pretty great. It's a much better reason than some conspiracy theory.

I got a brief start on my homebound lists today. I think I might have finished two patrons, so not a great start, but it's still a start.

I played around more with the Sphero and decided that I'm going to use markers for one of the activities. Originally I wanted to use toilet paper roles, but I don't have any of those, so markers that are stood on their ends work fine. The idea is that we can try driving around them without knocking any down, or pick specific ones to knock down while avoiding others. It's a challenge to do that while manually controlling the robot and could be even more interesting if the robot has to be programmed to do it by itself. The same with the maze or obstacle course I want to make. There is still only one person signed up for the workshop but there's still a day left.

I inadvertently agreed to making another personalized reading list today. As I was about the leave the teen librarian in charge of our desk so I could go to the department meeting a woman walked up. It was a little confusing to pick up on what she was saying but it was something about how she got a new list of books every month but hadn't gotten one in a month or two. At first I thought maybe she was talking about an email list or something she was subscribed to but it eventually became somewhat clear that she was talking about personalized reading lists. I had no idea who she was and hadn't heard her name before but I figured maybe someone else had been doing it and I just didn't know. I eventually found some old paperwork from several years ago and told her I would look into it and if I couldn't figure out what was happening I would make a list myself.

Turns out no one else really knew what was happening. The library who has been there forever said she had made a list for the lady a couple times but that was last summer. It looks like the last list she got was during the summer, so not a month ago, but the fact that the lady's timeline was off was not surprising. The hard part of the list is going to be that she is a high interest, low level reader, and I don't know if we really have those type of books. I need to ask around. The notes from several years ago noted that they had started trying young adult books but she wasn't quite there yet. It's going to be a little bit before I can devote my entire attention to it but I think tomorrow I'll send out some emails to Children's Department and see if they have some suggestions.

The department meeting went well. We talked about the chapter we read and the policy we were assigned. Related to the policy we also watched a couple short videos about censorship and what happens when books are challenged in the library. It was interesting. Thankfully we don't really get a lot of challenges and the ones we do get tend to be about children's books. We also celebrated the birthday of one of the librarian's in our department, as well as the library director. This meant there was a little more food than usual at the table.

After the meeting one of my coworkers, who is in charge of posting our newspaper articles on the library blog, asked me if I was going to send him my article. This reminded me that I had not actually sent my article to the newspaper yet. It was due at five o'clock and my coworker asked me this question at 4:55PM. Yikes. I scrambled to log onto a computer, find out what address to send my email to, attach my article and picture, and make sure my name was all over the place and spelled correctly so that maybe they would print my real name this time. I'm just glad my coworker said something because I had completely forgotten.

I then spent the last hour of the day trying to figure out the mystery of the personalized reading list lady with one of my fellow librarians. It involved a lot of detective work just to figure out who she was (relative to her personalized reading list history, not identity, which we already knew). We then did some searching to see what kind of books were out there.

After work I picked up Chipotle, only having to drive around the block once, and then headed to my Mom's house. We ate, watched YouTube videos, and then talked for quite awhile. I didn't leave until almost ten o'clock. That's late. While all that was happening I also updated my phone three times. Apparently my phone doesn't do software updates automatically. Nothing seems any different on my phone after all that but at least I'm up to date.

When I got home I did the same old thing and now I'm going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed. It's midnight and I want to go to bed. This is probably going to be a rambly audio journal unfortunately.

March 7, 2017

 I didn't keep track of my day but it was very productive. I feel a lot less stressed, which is great. This morning I finished my article and that immediately made my life better. I got it sent to the head of tech services who used to be an English teacher. She got back to me very quickly with a few edits but overall she liked it. Later on I had one of my fellow librarians edit it because her first masters degree was in English. She had a few more edits and it also led to me revamping the ending. The ending felt pretty tacked on and I wasn't too happy with it so I'm glad she pointed it out, giving me the opportunity to think more about it and come up with a better ending.

My other big achievement for the day was coming up with a better idea for my workshop on Thursday. And by “better” I mean an actual idea. I played with the Sphero more, getting a better idea of what it can do, and realizing how much I will never know about it because you can go super in-depth. But now I know what I want to do with it for the workshop. I want to push some of the tables together and set up a maze with weeded books. I also want to set up a square on the floor with good and bad people (which will probably just be roles of paper that are standing up) and the patrons will have to navigate around and knock over the bad people and not hit the good people. It all sounds good in my head, we'll see if I can get it to work out. At the moment the only person signed up is my fellow librarian's husband, who has come to all my workshops so far. There was also one other patron who expressed interest. Previously, I was hoping no one would come so I wouldn't have to come up with something, but now that I have something planned, I hope people do come.

I had time to read the chapter for our department meeting tomorrow. Another load off my mind. I still need to read the policy before the meeting. I thought about doing that tonight but the night has kind of gotten away from me.

I added some audiobooks to my green display today because one of my fellow librarians pointed out the audiobook section was overflowing. I think this was pointed out to her by the circulation people because when I went down to look at the audiobooks, two of the girls in circulation immediately came out to help me look for green covers. It was pretty funny.

My boss talked to me a little bit today about the project I kind of overheard yesterday but wasn't really listening. It turns out when they were remodeling the building with the city auditorium or gymnasium (I can't remember what they call it), they were wanting to get rid of it and just turn the whole place into basketball courts. It's the same place we evacuated to during drills at the school, so I vaguely remember it. There is a stage and seating but there is also a basketball court and I think they have volleyball tournaments there. I'm not really informed about the whole thing and I obviously wasn't paying that good of attention when my boss was describing it. Anyway, when the idea came out to get rid of it, it was brought to people's attention that when it was originally built it was dedicated to the memory of local WWII veterans, even though that hadn't been made very clear over the years. It may have been all veterans but WWII is sticking out to me. It sounds like the idea now is to make it more obvious and they want to get the community involved, and that includes the library. The first meeting about it is on Thursday morning, and I have the morning off so my boss is going to go just to find out what exactly is going on and what kind of commitment will be required. And if it works out I'll be the one taking it on. I think it sounds pretty interesting, even though I'm not entirely sure what my role will be or how much help I give. Time will tell.

Other than helping out the occasional patron, that was pretty much my day. Writing, reading, and playing with a robot. And probably some other stuff I'm forgetting about.

When I got home I ate dinner, watched YouTube videos, and played Tera. They opened an experimental test server, that among all the random test stuff, also includes bigger drops and faster leveling. The downside is that the server will be wiped fairly soon and nothing you get on it can be transferred to other servers, but leveling is my favorite thing so being able to do it at an exaggerated rate is cool with me. Even though I probably won't play long enough to get very high. I might never get back in, but it was fun tonight. I picked a Brawler character and it made me remember how much I like the Brawler class. It just feels right.

Around ten o'clock my sister stopped by to drop off the pretzels she made for the birthday thing tomorrow at work. I think we're doing it during our department meeting. Other people were bringing sweet things so I figured I would go with salty. And I may have been influenced by the fact that I would be able to eat the extra. Which I may or may not have already started doing. They're so good.

Now I'm going to record my audio journal so I can go to bed. I got a nice full night of sleep last night and that is not going to happen tonight. I would really like to get on a regular sleep schedule. Mentally and physically, it would be a nice change.